


walking in a dream

by artemis_west



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: M/M, Short One Shot, So be warned, This is super cheesy, it's adam's birthday!, mentions of the gangsey but they don't feature, ronan loves him v much and wants to do something special, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 18:49:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12415878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artemis_west/pseuds/artemis_west
Summary: It's Adam's 19th birthday, and Ronan has something special planned. (No smut, just softness.)





	walking in a dream

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a dream I had about pynch in a maze/garden making out lol. Miss Annabel is a character I made up for the purpose of this fic. I'm sorry if I make any mistakes or if it seems ooc - it's been a while since I read the books. And also none of my fics are ever beta'd. But hope y'all enjoy regardless!

It was Adam’s nineteenth birthday. 

He didn’t have anything special planned - he’d never liked to make a big fuss out of his birthday, and he’d never been one for parties. Of course Blue wanted to do something to celebrate, and Gansey thought Adam deserved something special, and Noah wanted a big party with glitter and confetti, but Ronan vetoed all of their suggestions and said they were just going to hang out at the Barns with a pizza from Nino’s. It would be quiet, peaceful, just the five of them and Opal. 

It had been nearly a year since they’d been together, but Adam was always struck in moments like these with how much Ronan just  _ knew  _ him, inside and out. 

Before they did any of that, though, Ronan was claiming Adam for himself. 

“Where are we going?” Adam asked when Ronan lured him into the BMW on the morning of his birthday, Opal strapped into the back seat. Ronan simply smiled - and what a  _ sight _ that was, Ronan Lynch with a true, genuine smile (it was a sight that had become more and more common since he and Adam started dating, but a sight that never failed to take Adam’s breath away every time) - and turned the key in the ignition. The BMW purred quietly to life. 

“You’ll see,” Ronan said as he drove out of the Barns. Chainsaw tittered in the back seat from where she was perched on Opal’s lap. She was in on the secret. It appeared Opal was too, from the way she grinned at Adam. 

It didn’t take them very long to get there - it was in the region of Singer’s Falls, where the Barns were located, so it wasn’t more than fifteen minutes away. But Adam had no idea it even existed until Ronan pulled the BMW into the small visitor’s parking lot. 

The sign at the entrance proclaimed it as “Singer’s Falls Rose Gardens.” There was an entry gate, an ironwork structure crawling with vines of ivy and flowers, and a little ticket booth next to it, with one lone clerk on duty. There were no other cars in the parking lot.

“What is this place?” Adam asked quietly as they got out of the car. He didn’t want to speak too loud; he was afraid it would disturb the peace. Adam was somewhat of an expert on sacred places by now, and this felt like one of them. It reminded him of Cabeswater - green, green everywhere, birds calling softly to each other in the air. 

“My mom used to take us here,” Ronan said, his voice suddenly gruff as he opened Opal’s car door for her. She climbed out, and Chainsaw took her customary perch on Ronan’s shoulder. Opal stood next to Adam and took his hand, biting her thumbnail as she looked around at the verdant scenery. 

Ronan cleared his throat and looked back at Adam. “I haven’t been here since before my father died.”

Adam let out a breath. Since they’d been together, Ronan had been slowly sharing pieces of himself, stories about his past and his childhood that only Gansey knew before, parts of his soul that he’d previously kept locked away in the cage around his heart. But that cage had been opened from the moment he’d first kissed Adam. Adam was always catching the birds that flew out of it. 

“I thought you’d like it,” Ronan said, blushing suddenly, reaching up to scrape the back of his head with his hand. He’d been letting his hair grow back a little, and he was no longer quite so shaved - dark hair was growing in, still close-cropped around his ears, but long enough that Adam could run his fingers through it. 

“I do,” Adam said, sincere and soft, and Ronan’s blush grew deeper. He nodded his head towards the ticket booth, and they walked over to the entrance together, Opal tripping along beside Adam. 

The clerk inside the booth smiled at them when they approached. She was an old woman, frail around the edges, but with kind eyes. Adam noticed her do a double-take when she saw Ronan with a raven on his shoulder. Adam straightened his own shoulders to prepare himself - for ridicule, for judgment, for misunderstanding - but he wasn’t prepared for what came out of the woman’s mouth. 

“Well, as I live and breathe! Do my old eyes deceive me, or is that Ronan Lynch I see in front of me?”

She didn’t blink an eye at Chainsaw. She didn’t blink an eye at Opal. Her smile was wide and warm for Ronan, face wrinkling as she reached her arm out of the window in the ticket booth to grasp Ronan’s hand. “Oh, it’s been years since I last saw you!”

“Miss Annabel,” Ronan said, blinking for a moment in surprise, and then pleasant recognition. “You’re still alive.”

Adam balked, but Miss Annabel laughed, high and bright. “Sure am, sugar. I ain’t done just yet. Last time I saw you, you had a full head of hair.”

Ronan shrugged, a smirk on his face. “Less maintenance this way.”

“Well, you do look as dashing as ever. And who’s this you’ve brought with you today? No Matthew? And no Declan, either, I see.”

“Not today,” Ronan shook his head. Matthew and Declan were still in DC together, though they visited often, and Ronan made sure to make the trips up to them whenever he found the time. Most of the time Adam went with him. 

“Adam Parrish, ma’am,” Adam said before Ronan could introduce him. He hadn’t lost his Henrietta roots, and they made him stretch his hand out to politely shake Miss Annabel’s. “It’s nice to meet you. And this is my cousin, Opal.”

They had been introducing Opal as Adam’s long-lost cousin whenever they took her out in public, and it was an easy enough lie for any curious strangers to swallow. Miss Annabel smiled down at Opal and offered her a lollipop that she produced from somewhere unseen in the ticket booth. Opal let go of Adam’s hand to take it, unwrapping it quickly and sticking it in her mouth. 

“What do we say?” Adam gently prodded her, a smile on his face. 

Opal took the lollipop out of her mouth and said, “Thank you,” to Miss Annabel, who put a hand to her chest and made a face, the kind that people made when they found something adorable. 

“She’s just darling,” Miss Annabel said. “What a beautiful girl.”

Adam ran his hand over Opal’s head, a habit he’d gotten into whenever she was near. She hummed around her lollipop. 

“Can we get three tickets, Miss Annabel?” Ronan opened his wallet and took out his card, but Miss Annabel shook her head. 

“No, no, no. None of that. No one else is here today, and I haven’t seen you in ages. You get in for free today.”

Ronan looked like he was about to protest, but Miss Annabel would have none of it. Adam wanted to protest too, his Henrietta upbringing rising in his throat, but instead he simply slipped a twenty-dollar bill out of his own wallet and silently slid it across the ticket booth. He only smiled when Miss Annabel shook her head, and under his insistent gaze, she smiled back and accepted the money. 

“Oh, alright then.” She put the money in a jar, took a set of keys from the wall in the booth, and exited through a small door on the back side of it. She went to the gate to unlock it for them, and Ronan helped her pull it open. She patted his arm, and he ducked his head bashfully. “Y’all have fun, now. Don’t get lost in there!”

“I still remember my way around,” Ronan said. Miss Annabel smiled and sequestered herself back in her ticket booth, leaving the gates to the gardens open. Adam and Opal followed Ronan in. 

“It’s a maze,” Ronan explained as he looked back at Adam. Opal let go of Adam’s hand to run ahead, giggling, and Chainsaw flew after her. 

It  _ was  _ a maze, with high walls of greenery around every corner, leaves and vines and flowers, mostly roses, crawling up to the top. Some of the vines met overtop of the maze and crisscrossed with each other, forming a ceiling. Sunlight filtered in through some of the cracks in it. The walls were higher than Ronan’s head. 

Ronan and Adam followed the path Opal had taken, and Ronan reached over to intertwine his fingers with Adam’s. Adam squeezed his hand. 

“This place feels like . . .” Adam said, lifting his face to the sunlight. He closed his eyes and smiled, his words suddenly lost to him. 

“I know,” Ronan said. “When Mom used to take us here, me and Matthew chased each other around the maze for hours. I always wanted to stay for longer.”

“Thank you,” Adam said. “For sharing it with me.” And he meant it. His heart felt almost uncomfortably full when Ronan did things like this. It was unexpected, and yet it wasn’t. 

Opal had disappeared around a corner with Chainsaw, but the raven’s squawk meant they weren’t far away. Ronan lead Adam a little deeper into the maze before he stopped in a pathway with red roses all around them. 

“Happy birthday, Parrish,” Ronan said quietly before he leaned forward and kissed Adam. 

Adam’s arms went around Ronan’s neck. His back hit the wall of the maze as Ronan kissed him, and he kissed back, their lips brushing softly and carefully before Adam deepened it. Ronan’s hand brushed his face, thumb caressing his cheek, running under his eye. Adam’s heart pounded in his chest and his stomach fluttered, as it still did every time Ronan kissed him, even after a year. 

When Adam was breathless, Ronan moved his lips to Adam’s neck and kissed a tender trail down his jaw. His stubble scratched Adam’s skin, but Adam had gotten used to the feeling, and it was something he loved now. He put his hand on the back of Ronan’s head and pulled him closer. Ronan’s arms wrapped tightly around Adam’s waist, and for a moment, they stayed like that, listening to the birds call to each other and the insects buzz. 

“Love you,” Ronan mumbled against Adam’s neck. Adam could tell Ronan was blushing because he wouldn’t show his face, and he smiled, turning his own face into Ronan’s neck as he rubbed the back of Ronan’s head. 

“I love you too,” Adam whispered. 

He’d never liked to make a big fuss out of his birthday. But if the rest of his birthdays were like this, Adam wouldn’t mind. 

He wouldn’t mind at all.


End file.
